What are Your Education Goals?

How do you define education?

Have you thought about what that word “education” means to you, for you, for your children?

Oddly, I find that most of us don’t.

One of the best exercises I think homeschool families can do is to sit down and write out what education means for them, for their school. What are your goals for your children?

Every school, public or private, has it’s definition of what education is to them, what they are trying to accomplish. As a homeschool, what are you trying to accomplish? What is your “end game”?

Personally, I’m working to help my children be the best they can be within who they are. To equip them with the skills and love of learning to flourish as individuals, to grow and become the person God intends for them to be.

For me it’s not about filling them with up with bits of knowledge, but teaching them to observe and learn, and grow their knowledge and skills as they need to for what they are working to accomplish. To provide them with a solid base to grow on, to build on with their own passions and interests.

I working to equip them with skills more than knowledge. But that’s me, and our school.

I have learned that not all schools look at education the same way. Their goals are not the same. This is true across public schools, across private schools, and definitely across home schools. That’s why we have choice.

You do not have to accept the “education” that the local private school or the local public school offers. You get to choose what education means for your children, for your school. And it may, and probably will, look different than another homeschool family. And that’s okay.

Your family, your school, your educational goals. Take an honest look at what you think of as education, and define it for you and your school.

Then write out your goals for your children, your students? And what are your educational goals for them?

Once you know what your end game is, it’s so much easier to stay the path, to measure against what you are trying to accomplish and not what the school down the street is doing. It’s easier to choose resources, make choices, and watch your children flourish when you are measuring against your goals and not someone else’s.